Picking Up The Pieces
by theDoctorlies
Summary: Naruto gets his heart broken and his best friend is there to pick him up.


Unbetaed so ignore any mistakes I missed.

* * *

When Sasuke broke up with him, Naruto erased all of his contact information, threw out whatever the bastard left in their apartment, and binged on ice cream until he was sick to his stomach. It took three weeks for Kiba to get sick of his sulking before the man showed up at his door with a six pack of beer and the whole fourth season of _Doctor Who _on DVD. They made it through the first disc and were in the middle of the second when Naruto sagged into Kiba's shoulder and finally let out all the hurt Sasuke had unleashed upon him. By the time he was out of tears to cry, Kiba's shirt was an ugly mess and Naruto was feeling considerably lighter for the first time in days.

_("He was a shit boyfriend and you deserve better." Kiba barked at him, right before tripping over the empty ice cream carton Naruto had left on the floor a few days ago.)_

It took a long time for him to get back to a place where he was marginally happier than before, well, Sasuke. Things had been so much simpler before he met Sasuke. Before, he'd still been crushing on Sakura and doing everything he could to get her attention. It was like after he met Sasuke everything else paled in comparison. He was so starry-eyed, head over heels, in love with the guy that he was blind to anything else. He was amazed that Kiba was still there to pull his head out of his ass and remind him there were still people that loved him.

_("Your world shouldn't revolve around just one person, Naruto! You'll miss a lot of good shit that way."_

_"That's deep, man.")_

Kiba was the best friend he'd ever had, but he didn't know just how much he needed the guy until then.

* * *

His first outing after Sasuke 2012 - as Kiba liked to call it - was to Sakura's house for her 25th birthday party. Everyone was so happy to see him and he was floored by the warm reception after he'd been such a dick to all of them. Sakura sat him down in one of the recliners, curled into his side like an overgrown cat, and told him about the man she'd met during one of her shifts at the hospital.

_("He came in with a mask on. There wasn't even anything wrong with his face!" she exclaimed._

_"Maybe he was ashamed of it." Naruto replied, trying not to smile at the look on her face, but he was failing. She just tilted her head up at him and smiled impishly._

_"I really missed you.")_

The party lasted well into the night and part way into the morning. He woke up wrapped around Kankuro with Chouji's face smooshed into his thigh and one of Lee's legwarmers dangling off of his foot It was the best he'd felt in a long time, even with the gross drool stain on his jeans.

Kiba took him home and they spent the day slaying each other in Halo and gorging on chocolate chip cookies.

* * *

Naruto went on his first date since he'd met Sasuke shortly after the party. He'd always been an equal opportunity guy, so it wasn't exactly a hardship to ask a beautiful woman out to dinner. Her name was Shion and she had the prettiest green eyes he'd ever seen on a woman save Sakura. They had so much in common it was ridiculous and her smile was bright and contagious. Their date was going so well and Naruto had wanted so badly to see her again, but as soon as he went to say something, his eyes drifted over to the door just as Sasuke was coming through it.

Seeing him for the first time in eight months was like a punch to the chest. He could feel his lungs seize up way before Sasuke actually looked over at their table. His eyes swept over Shion and Naruto carelessly, like he couldn't be bothered to have emotions and Naruto left the table without excusing himself and hid in the men's bathroom. He called Kiba and was talked down from the edge of a panic attack, and when he was feeling stable enough, he rejoined Shion and was incredibly relieved when he didn't see Sasuke seated at any of the tables.

Shion didn't want a second date, but Naruto had been expecting it so he wasn't hurt. She promised they could still be friends because he was a sweet guy and while Naruto was disappointed, he wasn't going to fault her for anything.

When he'd gotten home, he took a hot shower and let the water mask the tears even though there wasn't anyone else there to see them. Kiba and Shino showed up the next morning and talked him into going on a jog with them. He was sore afterwards but he was also thankful they'd gotten him out of his apartment for a little while.

_("I know it is difficult now, but you will be stronger person because of it." Shino told him. They were in a park sitting on a stone bench resting and Kiba was tossing a ball to his monstrous dog, Akamaru. Naruto had never heard Shino speak so much at one time and he felt bad for ever thinking the guy was creepy._

_"You're a pretty good guy, Shino. We should hang out more often." Naruto grinned at him. Kiba threw the ball at his face with a loud guffaw and Naruto screeched as Akamaru pounced on him and toppled the bench over.)_

* * *

It was in the middle of April, nearly a year after Sasuke, that the bastard showed up at the apartment looking like he hadn't gotten a decent night's sleep in weeks. Naruto just leaned against the door frame with a glare that felt weaker than he would've liked. The first words out of his mouth had been harsh, but Sasuke hadn't even so much as flinched.

"What the fuck could you possibly want?" Naruto growled out, trying to make himself seem bigger than he felt on the inside. His palms were clammy and his heart was starting to beat faster. Sasuke had always had a weird effect on him. Naruto figured that was why he'd been so in love before.

Sasuke looked at him for a long time, his eyes darting back and forth across Naruto's face. When he finally spoke, it wasn't anything Naruto was expecting.

"How'd you do it?" Sasuke demanded.

Naruto jerked back like he'd been slapped, because it was one thing to show up at unannounced, but it was an entirely different thing to show up stinking of alcohol and demanding answers.

"What the hell are you talking about, asshole?" Naruto hissed.

Sasuke crowded him into the apartment and slammed the door shut behind him, rattling the empty picture frames on the adjacent wall. He looked completely deranged.

"You were fucking devastated when I left. You begged me not to go. You sobbed." Sasuke snarled as he jabbed a finger into Naruto's chest, hard enough that the blonde knew that he'd have a bruise from it later. He rubbed the sore spot with his hand while he gave Sasuke an incredulous look.

"Are you serious right now?" Naruto exclaimed, walking around the couch with his hand out in front of him like he was fending off an attack from a wild animal. With the way Sasuke was panting, it wasn't a stretch of the imagination. "I can't believe you! Like it wasn't enough for you to completely ruin me for other people, you think it's okay to come back and rub it in? Fuck you and the horse you rode in on!"

In the three years they were together, Sasuke had never laid a hand on him. They argued like cats and dogs sometimes, but the bastard had never hit him. They weren't together anymore, but he' was stunned when Sasuke reared back and punched him in the face. Naruto could feel the impact Sasuke's knuckles made on his jaw, but he didn't hit the man back in retaliation. He just let himself stumble a few steps back, cradled his jaw with one hand and held onto the couch for support with the other.

"How much more are you going to hurt me before it's enough?" Naruto asked him, his voice quiet in the sudden stillness. Sasuke twitched like he'd been electrocuted and bolted for the door, slamming it so hard the picture frames fell of their hooks and cracked apart on the floor. Naruto went into the kitchen and grabbed a beer from the fridge to press against his jaw. He called Kiba a few minutes later and they spent the night watching reruns of Will & Grace.

_("What do you think he meant?" Kiba asked later, when they were switching DVDs out for the next season. Naruto tipped his head over the back of the couch, his jaw bruised and his heart forming new cracks alongside the old ones._

_"Fuck if I know." he answered, but he had a few ideas and none of them were going to do him any good.)_

He didn't break down like he thought he would the next morning, when he looked in the mirror and his jaw was dark purple. He just wrapped some ice in a bag and lazed on his couch until Kiba jerked awake on the floor. They spent a few hours playing Halo before they stopped so Kiba could get ready for work.

Before he shut the door behind him, Kiba asked him if he was finally over Sasuke. Naruto smiled and could honestly say he had and he told Kiba as much. The man just grinned, saluted him with two fingers, and then left the apartment.

* * *

He didn't see Sasuke for a long time after that. His life went on like usual. He started spending more and more time with the friends he'd avoided when Sasuke stumbled into his life. Naruto started dating again, too, but no one ever stuck. Something always seemed to be missing and he couldn't put his finger on what.

_("Have you gone on any dates with a man?" Sakura asked, one night when it was just the two of them curled up on the couch watching a movie that he couldn't remember the name of. Naruto had just given her a look, as if that was answer enough. "I'm serious! Maybe what your dates have been missing is a penis." she giggled at the word and Naruto rolled his eyes._

"_I wasn't attracted to men before Sasuke." The blonde told her. He was happy now that he could say his ex's name without flinching. It was a good feeling._

"_Then maybe you should consider one." Sakura leaned forward to grab her phone from where it was sitting on the table and thumbed through her contacts until Ino's name was highlighted. She pressed talk and Naruto was forced to sit there as he listened to the two of them make plans for another of their hair-brained blind date schemes._)

Which lead him to this moment; two years after Sasuke left his heart in pieces, dressed in the nicest clothes he owned as he waited for his blind date to show up. It was already half past six, which meant his date was either late or Naruto was being stood up.

He was getting up to leave when someone pulled out the chair across from him and sat down. Naruto looked up and was surprised to see Kiba staring back at him, looking nervous as he pulled at the cuffs of his sleeve.

"Hey, man." Naruto slumped back into his seat, but he couldn't think of anything to say. Kiba looked different all cleaned up. His hair was combed back a little and for once his clothes didn't have dog hairs or strange stains all over them. "Well don't you look like a proper gentleman. You got a date or something?"

The blonde swallowed around the lump in his throat and wiped his palms against his pants under the table. He thought he'd been hiding it so well, but of course, Sakura knew him better than that. She always knew what was on his mind, even when Naruto wasn't so sure himself.

"Yeah, something like that." Kiba replied weakly. A red haired waitress came up to their table and handed them two menus and then left them alone to get their orders straightened out. Naruto already knew what he wanted, but he kept the menu pulled up so Kiba wouldn't be able to see his face. He could feel the burn of embarrassment on his cheeks and all down the back of his neck. From his vantage point over the top of his menu, Kiba was more than a little embarrassed, too.

The date turned out to be a disaster. They'd been best friends for years, but they couldn't even talk to each other the way they did before. Kiba ended up dropping food on his pants and Naruto spilled his drink all over the tablecloth. There was stilted conversation, but more quiet than anything, and Naruto was completely out of his element. After it was over, they parted ways in the parking lot and he went home with a heavy heart.

The next morning, though, Kiba showed up at his door with a bag of greasy breakfast and a reddish-brown fox plushy tucked under his arm.

"The date was Sakura's idea. I told her you weren't into fancy restaurants but she was determined." Kiba shrugged, setting their breakfast on the table and handing the fox to Naruto. It had little black eyes and nine long tails that were white at the tips. The brunette sighed as he pulled out one of the chairs and pushed Naruto into it. "I always hated Sasuke, even before you started dating him. It felt like he was trying to covet you."

"He told he me was jealous that I gave my friends more attention than I gave him." Naruto admitted quietly, setting the fox plush on the table and staring at it. He remembered having one just like it when he was six years old, but a little boy with wild hair had dropped it in the mud and his mom couldn't wash it all out. "He never liked you either but I think I know why now." The blonde smiled slightly as he looked up, one of his hands curling into the bottom of Kiba's shirt.

Kiba leaned into his touch, bracing a hand on the table so he could hover over Naruto, lips parted and the darkness of his pupils expanding. The kiss was soft but it sent a spark of electricity over through his body, stopping to pool in his belly. He made a noise of protest, but Kiba only laughed as he dug through the bag with their breakfast.

As they ate and sniped at each other, Naruto thought about all the things that had brought them to this moment. It had been Kiba who'd picked up all his pieces, held them together with his own hands and stitched them back up. Things were only going to change between them from then on, but he knew they could only get closer.

-End-


End file.
